(WXYZ) — The explosion of COVID-19 infections is affecting hospital care across the state and there's no sign things will be slowing down anytime soon.
In 2021 we saw cases settle down after the holidays. That is not happening this time around.
"They're showing that we will likely peak between the end of January to early February and then after that things will start coming down," Dr. Bagdasarian said. "Now what's really up to us as a state is how high do we want that peak to be?"
Metro Detroit is at the center of the spread with the highest case rates and sequencing shows the more contagious omicron is the dominant variant. The estimate is about 90 percent.
Health experts say despite so many infected people this is not our path to herd immunity.
"It's much safer if we rely on vaccine and mediated immunity rather than everyone coming down with COVID in January and February of 2022," Dr. Bagdasarian said.
The tidal wave of infections is impacting kids and some are experiencing serious complications from the virus.
"The majority of children we cared for with serious and life-threatening illness due to COVID have recovered," Dr. Yagiela said. "However, these children can be in the hospital from anywhere from a few days to up to one to two months depending on how severe their illness was."
As we ride out our fifth surge testing continues to be a challenge.
On Tuesday, President Biden ordered health insurers to cover at-home tests. Meanwhile, the state is working on getting more to our schools.
Over 1.4 million antigen tests have been distributed to schools since 2020. And already this year more than 72,000 rapid antigen tests have been distributed to schools to support that test to stay protocol.
